to get the ship back to England, which is definitely a practical benefit.
MAJED: Well, I don’t agree with that, Leila, because from what I’ve read, the judge in the Stilk case decided that the sailors had already agreed to do the work.
EVIE: Sorry, but what are we talking about, exactly? Doing something you have already agreed to do or doing something which gives the other party practical benefit?
LEILA: Yes, we need to be clear here. Additional payment can only be enforced if the person doing the work provides a practical benefit, I think. Anyway, I’d just like to say that according to what I’ve read, in the Williams case the subcontractor did provide a practical benefit.
EVIE: In what way?
LEILA: Well, he finished the work on time and did a good job. Also, he enabled Roffey to avoid paying the penalty clause.
EVIE: I don’t get that. Wasn’t that a requirement under the original contract?
LEILA: What I’m trying to say is, Williams did more than he was originally asked to do.
MAJED: I still don’t understand. Can you give me an example, Leila?
LEILA: OK. Look at it this way. I agree to mend your car and you offer to buy me dinner in return for the work I have done. I enjoy mending cars but the work takes longer to do than I thought. You offer to pay me some money as you want the car for the weekend. I get the car working and that evening you take me out to dinner. You then drive off and don’t pay me the money. I have provided you with a practical benefit because you get the car for the weekend.
MAJED: So, the promise to pay extra money has to be supported by consideration?
LECTURER: Absolutely. In making a decision about a contract, the courts have to think about whether there is good consideration provided by a practical benefit which is more than just the performance of an existing contractual duty.
MAJED: Yes, and I’d just like to say something else. As I mentioned before, the judgment in the Stilk case is still considered to be sound and Williams and Roffey does not overturn it. Although the Williams case challenges the traditional view of consideration, it has not been followed by judges in many other cases.
126
Unit 9, Lesson 2, Exercise B 2.1 Part 1
Good morning, everyone. I’m going to talk to you this morning about dismissal from employment, and in particular, two important types of dismissal. These two types are known as unfair dismissal and wrongful dismissal. As you can probably guess from the names, they are both claims against employers – ways in which employees can seek redress if they have been sacked by their employers or have lost their jobs in other ways.
In this lecture, I’m going to compare and contrast the two kinds of claim. First, I’ll talk about unfair dismissal, and then I’ll go on to wrongful dismissal. But, because there are great similarities, I will make points about both kinds throughout the lecture.
But before we begin I have a little story to tell you … I once worked for a small legal company with a very dynamic boss who had lots of good ideas and was very good with people. However, he wasn’t very good at the financial side of the company. He didn’t like working with numbers and details and he was very forgetful. His financial management was terrible and I lost my job after a year because the company went bust. Of course, in that case, I didn’t have a claim for unfair dismissal or wrongful dismissal, but the point of that story is that, through no fault of their own, employees can lose their jobs. And if this happens, it’s important for employees to know what action they can take to obtain compensation.
So, to get back to the main part of my lecture. Now to start with, as we’ve already noted, it’s clear that people can lose their jobs in a variety of different circumstances. Increasingly we find that when people do lose their jobs, especially when they believe it’s through no fault of their own, they want to know how the law will protect them. In fact, as we will see, the courts provide protection in a number of ways.
At the beginning of the lecture I mentioned two types of dismissal: unfair dismissal and wrongful dismissal. It’s the first of these, unfair dismissal, that I’m going to focus on now, although it’s worth pointing out that in certain circumstances an unfair dismissal can also be a wrongful dismissal and vice versa. I’ll give you some of the important case law citations later on.
OK, so to start with, let’s take a few moments to consider the key point about unfair dismissal. What is unfair dismissal? Firstly, unfair dismissal is a statutory invention. In other words, it didn’t exist
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128 |
Page 129 |
Page 130 |
Page 131 |
Page 132 |
Page 133 |
Page 134 |
Page 135 |
Page 136 |
Page 137 |
Page 138 |
Page 139
